Faye's Diary

Chapter 4: What Is Going On?

'This is the journal of Charlotte Baskerville and it is new. As you will know from my previous diary, my favourite colour is pink and I love to write and read! Anyway, welcome to my diary!

14th July, 4:15pm

School today was ok. We had History first which would have been fine (I like history) but we have a stupid assessment to do. I have taken notes for it and I am feeling pretty confident but it’s just a bore to do, especially since we are taught by the head teacher.

After that, we had PHSE, and that was brilliant. I like PHSE because all you do mainly is sit down and discuss things. At the moment, we have to get with a partner and do a presentation on a person that we find inspirational. Me and my all time best friend forever, Merci are doing Edgar Allan Poe because I love his poems. They inspire me to write poetry so there you go!

We also had Maths today, but I don’t want to talk about it. It was way too boring, I absolutely hate maths! But I love English, especially the teacher, she is really nice. At the moment, we are doing a project on a girl called Charlotte Dymand, her story is so sad; she was murdered and no-one ever found out who truly did it. Her boyfriend was hanged for it, but what if he didn’t do it.

But lately, I have been wandering what it would be like to be living with her? Not Charlotte Dymand, of course, but her. I have been wandering about it for a while now, but I don’t want to ask Hilary because she may be upset. One day I might mention it to her, if I get brave enough. Ha, I will never get brave enough so I will never tell her!

I have got to go now, Hilary is calling me. She probably wants me to help make dinner! Bye!’

This wasn’t written by a seven year old. This girl had to be eleven or twelve at least; she was in secondary school and everything!

If this was so then it couldn’t have been written by my sister. Because my sister died when she was seven. And what did she mean when she said, 'her’? Who was she, and who was Hilary?  But most importantly, how did she write this?

Then, suddenly, a thought popped into my mind. Could there be a sick, sick person out there that knew about Charlotte and was pretending to be her? Maybe this person wants attention, so they looked up deaths of children and pretended to be them, and then when it was reported, they felt good about themselves. Stranger things have happened, you hear about these things in the paper all the time, sick and ill people.

Now I was just being stupid, maybe she was just really clever when she was seven and wrote really neatly and used posh words. Maybe she was so clever that they had to move her up a few classes where they studied things like history and PHSE.

I sighed, realising that I was being stupid again. My whirling head slowed down and I began to think more rationally. Why would anyone want to pretend to be my sister? Even for a madman that was pretty far-fetched, and if she really was a genius, I’m sure I would know about it. Mum would never pass up an opportunity to rub in my face that my sister was a genius and I wasn’t.

Just then I heard the creak of the stairs and I knew Mum was on her way up. I didn’t know if she was going to come into my room, but I didn’t want to risk it. I leaped out of bed and sprung over to the removed floorboard, which I then covered up. Then, I shoved Charlotte’s diary under my pillow, just in time to see my door open. Mum carefully stepped into my room and peered over me.

“Are you awake, darling?” She said to me quietly.

I pretended to have been sleeping and I turned around and mumbled, “Yeah, kind of. I’m just tired, that’s all.”

I peered at Mum through my fringe and saw she was looking very concerned. “Are you ill? Don’t you feel very well, do you have a temperature?”

“I feel fine Mum, I’m just tired. I just need a little extra sleep,” I said to her, and she nodded, kissed me on the top of my head and left.

As soon as I heard the door shut, I sat up. I knew it would look a little bit strange if I didn’t turn the light out when I had just told Mum that I was tired, so I opened up the secret space and put back Charlotte’s diary. Then I turned out my light and clambered into bed. For a long while that night, I lay awake, thinking of my discovery. It was in the early hours of the morning that I thought of a plan. During our little chat tomorrow, I would ask Mum a few questions about Charlotte. And it was only after this thought came to me, that I was able to smile in the darkness and go to sleep.